


microwave meals and math student meltdowns

by neville



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Bathroom Sex, Breakfast, M/M, Pre-Threesome, Television Watching, a lot of crying math students, better get these sexy tags out of the way first y'know, rowan is just a Confused College Student, slutty charlie weasley, so you know what you're getting in to
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-02
Updated: 2018-06-02
Packaged: 2019-05-17 10:14:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14830370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neville/pseuds/neville
Summary: Here is Rowan Khanna’s predicament.There is a fraternity house three blocks down hosting the party of the year – red solo cups, booming bass, sex on the dishevelled heap of coats – but Ben Copper has just asked Rowan if he’d do Ben a solid and cover his shift down at the 24-hour library, where apparently the math majors have set up tents trying to cram for their finals.





	microwave meals and math student meltdowns

**Author's Note:**

> can ya'all pray for my soul, i think i need jesus after writing this

Here is Rowan Khanna’s predicament.

There is a fraternity house three blocks down hosting the party of the year – red solo cups, booming bass, sex on the dishevelled heap of coats – but Ben Copper has just asked Rowan if he’d do Ben a solid and cover his shift down at the 24-hour library, where apparently the math majors have set up tents trying to cram for their finals. Rowan’s curiosity is piqued. He wants to know what kinds of snacks math majors eat to keep them alive, and fuck, he’d just like to spend a night in the library and pretend he’s _Night at the_ fucking _Museum_.

But Bill Weasley is at that party, and Rowan has spent the past year of his college life losing his shit and discovering his sexuality over Bill Weasley.

Whichever option he chooses, he is absolutely fucked. If he decides to whittle away his almost-blossoming college life by taking a free shift at the library, he will miss out on Bill Weasley (but not miss out on the joy of inhaling book-smell, an activity Rowan doesn’t get to do so much now that he can’t even afford a book a month unless it’s digital and on sale). If he goes to the party, he is going to have a terrible time because he can barely stand the burn of alcohol in the back of his throat and because he can also barely stand anybody else at the college. He should’ve gone somewhere better. He should’ve done Harvard – but he can barely afford this run-of-the-mill state college, so where the hell else could he have gone?

Doesn’t stop him regretting, though. He’ll never be Bill Gates now.

Spinning around on the barstool behind the desk of the record store he works in, he decides to consult Tumblr. Rowan is startlingly popular on the website, yawning out his thoughts about every franchise that takes off everywhere across the social media spectrum and smashing out a fanfic now and then. Occasionally a fanfic involving copious amounts of sex, because Rowan has to make up for his saint-like lifestyle somehow, and he’s never going to manage enough food to eat more than microwaveable pasta for the rest of his student life. People also keep sending him asks about college. He’s not sure how to answer, because the real answer to surviving college is never sleeping, making sure to eat three meals a day even if they’re all Pot Noodle, and studying so hard he’s started getting migraines.

 **anonymous** asked you:  
_be a good Samaritan and go help your friend at the library xx_

 **anonymous** asked you:  
_you’ll get other chances with that guy you like. parties are shit anyway_

Rowan groans so loudly at the messages that a patron whose entrance he hadn’t noticed gives him a frightened look, and he shoots an apologetic look back. It’s certainly not his job or his prerogative to scare customers off from his own stresses, and he tries to shift the thought as he asks if the customer is looking for anything specific –

and joyfully enough for Rowan, he is indeed. So the predicament gets to sit a little longer in the back of his brain.

By the time he’s finished work and has consumed a dinner of grilled cheese, he’s long since given up on the idea of the party. He doesn’t feel damn near sociable enough, and just the thought of drinking alcohol makes his stomach churn; Rowan’s not so good at surviving an entire day without a nap, and he wonders if it’d be acceptable just to doze off behind the front desk to the lull of weeping students. Or maybe he could just read.

Maybe write a chapter or two of his ongoing no-powers high school Spiderman and Deadpool romance epic.

The library’s pretty quiet for all the myths he’s heard: when he arrives, there are indeed actual camping tents set up where some tables used to be and a good selection of about ten math majors all camped out inside and a couple milling about with packets of crisps. One boy is eating a pot of pasta in the doorway to the library kitchen; Rowan figures that the anarchy has already been installed, so brews himself a cup of tea and takes his spot at the library front desk, picking at the various knickknacks and tchotchkes.

He’s slight enough from his pasta-related malnutrition to be able to fit into the bucket chair with his legs crossed, and he serves an hour in peace with his cup of tea and his Kindle and a trashy gay romance novel he bought for a dollar on the Kindle store. He used to feel guilty, but he can’t find it in himself to even summon a single piece of guilt shrapnel; he spends so much time reading textbooks with sentences he has to decipher like he’s a codebreaker not a student that he needs some kind of switch-off, and who’s to say he isn’t allowed a bit of mind-numbing reading?  

And, all in all, Rowan’s having a pretty decent conclusion to his dilemma when he hears the sound of footsteps approaching and glances up from between the pages of unabashedly shameful sensual pottery. It’s a math student. His cheeks are tear-stained.

“Got any tissues?” he asks nervously. Rowan does not, but he can’t say the same for his well-stocked maze of a temporary desk, and he finds a packet in one of the jam-packed drawers, handing it over to the student, whose arms are surprisingly muscular for a math geek. Rowan wonders if he’s in the soccer team; he’s too short for basketball. He asks. The math boy laughs. “Oh, no, I’m not in a big sport. I’m on the lacrosse team, but I’ve taken a break for the math stakeout.”

“Have you considered that studying at home might be more relaxing?” Rowan asks, offering the math boy a stress ball; he declines, likely on the fact that it’s the grottiest thing Rowan’s ever had the misfortune of picking up and he immediately counters it with a choking amount of hand sanitiser.

“I work best under stressful conditions,” math boy elaborates. “And since I’m living in a tent, I don’t have time to worry about all the stupid things I usually worry about, like plucking my eyebrows or what clothes I’m wearing or how my hair looks.”

Math boy has little more than a buzzcut. Rowan raises his eyebrows, but says nothing, and avoids letting his eyes linger for too long on the math boy’s incredibly extra outfit of a striped turtleneck and wide leg red corduroy pants with some on-trend ugly Nikes. Rowan has to admit that he’s good-looking, and he does like math boy’s dedication, and he hasn’t had sex since that time with his best friend in the back of a rental in high school. So. He wouldn’t mind.

“I’m Andre,” math boy says. Shit. He’s likely noticed Rowan’s unsubtle idea of checking him out, but the name drop can only be a good sign.

Rowan goes in for the handshake. He’s so thirsty that he practically gets flushed from that alone. “Rowan. Khanna. History.”

And, with that, Andre returns to his inevitable doom and Rowan returns merely to imagining the fires of passion. It’s not that he’s ever been particularly interested in sex, or romance, or any of that - but it’s been way too long, and he’s going to cry if he eats any more microwave meals, and he wants someone to distract him from the call of the void that seems to follow being a single college student with at least two crushes. He groans.

“Problem?” an inquiring voice laughs. Rowan recognises the accent: it’s Southern and hillbilly but too gentle to belong to an actual hillbilly, and his head snaps up, expecting Bill Weasley and his tousled hair and his fang earring and his accepting attitude and his lax alternative style–

but it’s just an amused Charlie, and Charlie’s no Bill. He’s shorter, with a shaved head, an explosion of freckles, and a dragon tattoo. But God, Rowan thinks. As handsome as Bill. Just less outgoing. Charlie purportedly just lets things happen.

“I hate being a student,” Rowan sighs, and Charlie concurs. Their eyes meet long enough for Rowan’s heart to skip a beat. He looks like Bill.

Charlie leans in.

“Bathroom?”

“Oh, Christ, please.”

Rowan doesn’t bother making a sign explaining his absence; nobody seems to want to speak to him, and that’s probably because it’s eleven at night and the only people in the library are the math crew, those lacking in the will to live, and him.

And he’s now backed up against the wall of the disabled toilet with Charlie under his waistband, so he’s not sure he gets to stack up well anymore.

Charlie makes short work of Rowan and lets him sink to the floor, breathless. He sets himself up, legs wrapped around Rowan, but sits still anyway. It’s a shit vantage point.

“Math?” Charlie asks.

“History.”

“Cryptozoology.”

“What the hell’s that?”

“I get to go on field trips to find wendigos.”

“ _Oh, my fiery feet! My burning feet of fire!_ ”

“That’s the one. Can you get on all fours?”

Rowan does, resisting the familiar urge to gasp as Charlie pushes himself between Rowan’s thighs and lets this follow with tumbling expletives. Rowan can feel Charlie’s hands shaking a little where they hold his waist, and doesn’t think he’s worth that much, honestly.

Charlie starts moving, slowly at first but unable to temper himself. “Oh, God, I can’t,” he stutters, pushing faster and faster until Rowan’s thighs ache and he thinks he might come again just from the sounds of Charlie slipping over the edge and him grabbing Rowan’s hair as he thrusts.

Rowan’s so easy.

Charlie spills over his legs and then flips him round to finish Rowan off again until he can’t see straight anymore and is lying enjoying the last of his ethereal moments before he comes back into the realisation that he’s lying on the floor of a bathroom stall and his stomach is sticky and his hair is so out of order that he looks like he hasn’t brushed it in weeks.

He groans, and starts a little when he feels something soft run across his snail trail and down to his legs.

Charlie’s cleaning him up with a wet wipe.

“Do you carry those around with you everywhere?”

“Listen, do you want to try and clean yourself up with one-ply?”

Rowan supposes not. “Thanks.”

“You volunteer librarians. You always look like you’re desperate for it.”

“I’m covering for my friend Ben.”

“Even more desperate.”

“Have you and Ben ever…?”

“No. He kinda looks like he’d fall apart. I’ve got a bit of a thing going with Tonks, though. She’s amazing.”

“So, Charlie, what exactly started you on your path of having bathroom sex with all the student librarians?”

“I don’t know, really. It happened once and then I just kept going for it. Makes me feel a little less like I want to drive away and never come back.”

Charlie runs a hand across Rowan’s cheek and tucks some of his hair behind his ear. Rowan looks back at him.

“I get that,” Rowan says, and stands up.

* * *

Rowan is not very pleasantly woken from his slumber at seven in the morning by the next student volunteer, who seems entirely nonplussed by the fact that Rowan has slept through the majority of his cover shift.

He decides to be cordial enough to return the mug he’d borrowed to the kitchen, and of course, just to ensure that Rowan Khanna never gets any peace and is always living a life of predicaments, Andre and Charlie are kissing in the corner.

“I know this library is twenty-four-hour, but you _can_ go home,” Rowan sniffs. “You can wait before your next conquest.”

“I was waiting for you,” Andre clarifies, and he laughs awkwardly for a moment. “I hate being in that fucking tent. I’m not learning anything. It’s not even a political stance; the board don’t care. I saw you two go into the bathroom yesterday, and- goddammit, I just want to be free to do what I want to do and not eat their idea of fucking meals which have no nutritional value whatsoever!”

“If we’re having sex, we’re going to breakfast first,” Rowan says. Charlie laughs.

“I’ll pay,” he says.

They have a slightly crappy breakfast in Starbucks, but the caffeine hits Rowan like a sledgehammer, righting all the wrongs in his system like the ultimate pill. Charlie has a roll and a hot chocolate and seems at an almost eerie bliss at his corner of the table, as if the stress of student life has entirely evaded him. Andre’s still got that math student vibe of being permanently jittered. He takes two toilet breaks in the time it takes them to eat breakfast.

“Don’t you drink coffee, Charlie?” Rowan asks. He has to ask. He doesn’t even understand how someone could survive a day in college without being fuelled through it by caffeine highs and bathroom blowjob crashes. Andre’s drinking tea, but that’s still caffeine.

“No,” he says. “I don’t like it.”

Rowan is hit by a wave of newfound respect for Charlie: under the influence of no stimulants, he survives daily college life, from lessons to screwing in library bathrooms, and he never once seems to look out of place. He almost wants to think _fuck Bill_. Bill might be cool, but Rowan’s seen him disheveled and grumpy in sweatpants: Charlie doesn’t seem to know how to be a mess, and though Andre is clearly an emotional wreck, he’s an emotional wreck in good trousers.

“I don’t want to have sex,” he says suddenly, and Charlie looks up so quickly that Rowan is hit by the urge to retract the statement; but it’s true, so he ploughs on. “I’m tired. And I want to just – watch Netflix with you guys.”

“If I’d known you’d say that, I’d have let Charlie do me in that kitchen,” Andre huffs, but concedes. Rowan’s correctly gauged that he also doesn’t have the energy left in him for any sort of vigorous physical exercise, or even any mental exercise. Rowan wonders what would happen if he asked Andre to read a book; perhaps he’d explode. “Depends on what you’re watching.”

“My vote’s on a Stranger Things marathon,” Charlie says.

This is how Rowan finds himself making out with his crush’s brother on a math student’s sofa whilst Barb finds herself left on her own at the pool. He bloody _likes_ Stranger Things, too, but Charlie’s handsy. He can barely catch a breath because Charlie’s made it his mission to steal them all. Andre is content with Netflix.

Doesn’t stop him from nabbing a kiss or two.

Rowan’s not sure if this was the ideal answer to his initial predicament: after all, Charlie isn’t Bill, and he now seems to have acquired two boyfriends that his parents will disapprove of and whom he barely knows at all. But he guesses that he’s probably chosen right, because he’s not hungover, and he _does_ have two boyfriends, one of whom is kind of the supreme Bill, the other a sobbing math student with an infectious smile and a sharp sense of style.

He could’ve had worse. And this is his reflection of the day that makes it to Tumblr, right after Peter Parker’s confession of love to Wade Wilson, a true slow burn at Chapter 52.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading this!! my tumblr is @khannarowan if you want to, i don't know, question my life decisions


End file.
